U.S. federal agency within DHS that administers immigration benefits, including visas, green cards, naturalization, and work authorizations like H-1B.
Applications to the March 2026 H-1B lottery fell more than 38% from a year earlier, USCIS said, while the $100,000 fee stays held up in the courts. Business Insider concludes that employers with cash and workers with scarce skills come out ahead.
Reality
CNBC's analysis of USCIS data finds two-thirds of Microsoft's 6,258 fiscal 2025 H-1B approvals went to existing employees. That undercuts Vance's claim that visa hires replaced laid-off staff, but the PERM suspension covers green cards, outside this count.
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Homeland Security proposed making US schools pay $70,000 for each international student entering the OPT work program, plus $30,000 per renewal. Colleges would be paying for one of their main recruiting draws, and Fortune reported that new foreign enrollment fell 17% last fall.
Perspective Coverage
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US officials are suspending Microsoft, Cognizant, Capgemini and five other named firms from the PERM green-card program, citing alleged fraud. Meta, Amazon and Google keep access, leaving the named firms to recruit against rivals that can still sponsor.
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Skilled foreign workers are putting off homes and job moves amid the contested $100,000 H-1B fee, according to Business Insider interviews. For managers, a promotion or transfer that needs an amended petition can look like risk to the employee holding the visa.
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The proposed per-petition fee runs 21 to 52 times what cap-subject petitions used to cost, and its exemptions steer hiring toward whoever is already in the US. Comment is the last stop before finalisation.
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State is expected to revoke B1 and B2 visas issued since 2016 to holders who later sought asylum. The disqualifying act happens after the trip is booked, and officials will not name a date.
Perspective Coverage
3 publishersReality
The charge is 20 to 50 times current levels and is being pushed through despite adverse rulings. What it reprices is not the paperwork but where companies put the work.
Perspective Coverage
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DHS says the money is cost recovery, not restriction. For employers, the difference is a contingent $203,265 per hire abroad and a headcount plan hostage to litigation.
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Business Insider's year-later series on the H-1B crackdown opens with a Northwestern graduate who left Chicago for Germany after her employer said it could not sponsor her visa. The sponsorship call was the employer's.
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The employment-based backlog has passed 1.2 million people against a statutory ceiling of 140,000 a year, which means the preference category an employer files in now matters more to a skilled hire's tenure than the offer letter.
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Blumenthal's whistleblower has work starting June 15, stopping June 25 and restarting July 29, which leaves 58 usable days inside a three-month window, plus a design where one bad scan holds a whole batch.
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The proposed cap-subject fee reaches first-time petitions for people already in the US, at any employer size. Run DHS's 1 percent revenue test backwards and the break-even sponsor sits near $10.3 million.
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